The Miami Heat know the sample size is scant, to a man in the aftermath of Saturday night’s putrid 123-99 loss to the Indiana Pacers noting that the game was only the team’s fourth out of 38 with all components of the primary rotation available.

So even though it’s January, even though the midpoint of the season is only days away, even though Erik Spoelstra’s team managed to fall at Gainbridge Fieldhouse to the team with the NBA’s worst record, the gist in the postgame locker room was of patience.

But even that has to be on the clock, with the clock also ticking toward the Feb. 5 NBA trading deadline, amid a ramp up to that deadline that already has seen Trae Young moved and apparently now has Ja Morant on the block.

That, of course, is a management concern.

In the locker room, the goal is to manage this mix that has included the injection of Tyler Herro back into the starting lineup, the shuffle of Kel’el Ware to the second unit, and a rotation that remains unsettled.

“I mean, you gotta think about it,” guard Norman Powell said, “like we’ve played a certain way for a while, you know, we had Pelle (Larsson) in the starting lineup, and then we went to the big lineup, and then another guy comes back in Tyler who’s a scorer and can really boost your offense, and now everybody has to adjust and figure it out.

“It’s not gonna be as soon as it happens, as soon as everybody’s healthy we’re gonna be playing and clicking on all cylinders.”

The Heat hardly were that on Saturday night, their deficit reaching 29, closing at 4 of 30 on 3-pointers, committing 19 turnovers.

“Now you gotta readjust and figure it out,” Powell said. “Rotations are different. Usage is different. So it’s all about having some time under the belt to really build that cohesiveness.”

To Powell, adding a high-usage player such as Herro requires adjustment, but not necessarily in a painful way.

“I mean, it’s a little different, just in terms of like the flow of the offense and like how it goes and positions of where everybody’s at,” said Powell, limited to six points in the loss, his first game this season in single digits.

The revised lineup Saturday was the return to the group that entered 2-2, with Bam Adebayo at center, Andrew Wiggins at power forward, Powell at small forward, Herro at shooting guard and Davion Mitchell at point guard.

“You have Bam playing the five. Andrew’s playing the four. Without Kel’el, Wiggs is playing the four now. I’m playing the three,” Powell said. “So it’s all about trying to play off one another.”

The lineup, Spoelstra said, has the components that should work.

“That group, when they’ve played together, there’s been an explosive offensive group,” he said. “That’s been a small sample size.”

Which had him somewhat downplaying Saturday as an example of failure.

“This is a very small sample size collectively as a team,” he said of the loss to the Pacers.

Herro said he believes there is no turning back, albeit while also being listed midday Sunday as questionable due to a recurrence of his toe issue, as well as a chest contusion.

“We all want to make it work. We just got to make it work,” Herro said after leading the Heat with 21 points Saturday, the only starter with more than 13, with the Heat dropping to 3-5 in Herro’s appearances with the loss in Indiana.

Adebayo said the revised lineup will work because it has to work in order to maximize the roster.

“It’s gonna take some time,” he said, with the Heat turning their attention to Sunday night’s challenge of the defending-champion and league-best Oklahoma City Thunder at Paycom Center, at the close of their trip. “Guys have been in and out of the lineup. Plug and play, we’re trying to figure it out.

“So hopefully we can stay healthy and get through this bump.”